Project on the comparative study of Harappan and Mesopotamian civilization.
Answers
1
Introduction
The Harappan culture flourished in the Indus and adjoining river valleys during
the second half of the third millennium BCE. The research carried out in this field
for nearly a century has harnessed an enormous amount of data which has been
helpful in understanding the formative stages through the maturity,
deurbanisation, and the ultimate transformation to rural cultures
through investigations by various scholars like Cunningham (1875: 105-
108), Marshall (1930), Mackay (1938), Wheeler (1968), Joshi (1993),
Lal (1978: 65-97), Thapar (1973: 85-104), Bisht (1987; 1991: 71-82),
Possehl (1999), Kenoyer (1991), to name a few. Ever since the concept
of the ‘Indus Civilisation’ was understood in the 1920s, more and more
sites were added to the corpus of Harappan sites, and the site count
today stands at 477 for early Harappan; 1,022 for mature Harappan,
and 1,281 for post-urban Harappan cultures (Possehl 1999: 1-33). The
recent excavations at places like Harappa (Kenoyer et al. 1991: 331-
75), Dholavira (Bisht 1976: 16-22; 1987; 1991: 71-82; 1993: 35-38;
1994: 23-31), Rakhigarhi (Nath 1997-98: 39-45), etc., have enabled
us to understand the dynamism in the evolution, maturity and ultimate
decline of this civilisation.
However, several scholars have recorded that the beginnings of
Harappan studies can be traced back to March or April of 1829